


Tender Places

by sirsparklepants



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Family Bonding, Found Family, Gen, Getting to Know Each Other, Parenthood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2020-10-11
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:20:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26958721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirsparklepants/pseuds/sirsparklepants
Summary: The first time they shared an inn room was a disaster.The second time was... better.The third time was nearly a catastrophe.Or, how Geralt and Ciri learn to trust each other on the way to Kaer Morhen.
Relationships: Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon & Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia
Comments: 10
Kudos: 106





	Tender Places

**Author's Note:**

> I, like a lot of people, have a rather... fraught relationship with the concept of parenthood. In fact, it makes me really nervous to see good parents in fiction because it makes me feel like they're hiding something! But at the same time, I really like exploring imperfect-but-trying parents, and I like the potential of Geralt and Ciri's (and Ciri and Yennefer's, though she doesn't yet appear here) relationship. So I had to write something to resolve the tension there. So here, have a bunch of words about Geralt and Ciri tripping all over each other's needs but loving each other and trying anyway. As always, thanks to my horse friends for answering my ten thousand questions about Roach!

Geralt didn't know what to do with a child. His last memory of interacting with a girl Ciri's age was Marilka, and that had ended... badly. But Ciri wasn't like Marilka. She was wary and flinching where Marilka had started out open and gregarious. Ciri was dirty from her long trek. Distrusting. She let Geralt hold her to guard against the chill, took the food he gave, listened to him, but there was something in her ready to run, even as he could tell she wanted to trust him. She reminded Geralt of nothing more than the boys just arrived at Kaer Morhen. The boys who'd just been through the Trials. Boys who'd been through an ordeal, who thought it ended, but who couldn't see how it could be, how they were safe. And they were right. Ciri was right. There was no safety in the life of a witcher, no safety on the run. And yet Geralt found he would give her as much of it as he could.

It was a staggering, limping process getting to know Cirilla. She asked him questions - abruptly, after long periods of silence, like she'd been weighing what was worth breaking the silence of their solitary travels - but entertained few about herself. She wouldn't wash the dirt from her hair or her clothes. She padded about their campsites quietly, breaths shallow and controlled, footsteps as soft as untrained feet in boots could be. She was as different from his last travel companion as a bruxa was to a fleder, and Geralt doubted a child raised by Calanthe had been this quiet, this inclined to disappear, before her country fell. But they were on the run. They were in danger. She needed those tendencies if he were to die defending her.

Instead of trying to bring her out of her shell, like Jaskier would, Geralt encouraged her. He taught her to listen for the normal noise of wildlife, how to tell if something was missing or out of place. He taught her how to light a fire, set a snare, dig for roots that were often less deceptive than forest berries. And he taught her how to shrink in on herself in a crowd, how to keep downwind, how to keep her steps light on floorboards, mud, the forest floor. What worked to keep a hulking witcher to minimal notice would keep a young girl, a war orphan most people were inclined to ignore anyway as yet another mouth to feed, quite beneath most people's attention. She took to every lesson like her life depended on it, and after a week or so, she stopped shrinking when they were on their own.

* * *

The first time they shared an inn room was a disaster.

Out in the open, with a hunted charge to care for, Geralt hadn't felt secure enough to sleep, substituting meditation instead. But his body was ravaged by the ghoul poison, still, so they had to make for an outlying village, where the echoes of the hooves of a Nilfgaard patrol would carry further, not muffled by the trees, and the walls would give him ways to funnel attackers. It was a risk, but he'd learned from the djinn incident how little sleep he could get away with without impeding healing, reflexes, mental functioning - and he was riding the edge. He couldn't risk Ciri that way. 

The small settlement Geralt had picked was off main roads, and had an inn primarily so the villagers would have someplace to gather during the winter. But there was a small room in the back, usually used for men too drunk to make it home through the snow, by the smell, and the innkeep was happy to settle an old soldier and his charge ("granddaughter?" the man asked him in an undertone, and Geralt, who was trying to pass as closer to his actual age, shook his head and told the man, "her mother was a lot younger than me, she was a surprise" with the face of a man trying to be discreet about his bastard) before settling into his own bed.

The smallness of the room was a blessing; it was well-insulated enough that Geralt and Ciri could sleep separately for once, a bit of space he desperately needed. From the speed at which she set her blankets up, Geralt suspected Ciri did too. They exchanged little conversation, only passed their traveling food back and forth between them before settling in. Geralt wondered if he should wish her a good night, but before he could decide, her breathing evened out into sleep, and he closed his eyes.

It seemed like it had only been a moment when he opened them again, tense, though the light that drifted under the door from the hearth in the main room had dimmed. Geralt concentrated, trying to make out what had woken him. It wasn't a mass of hoofbeats, and the only breathing he could hear was his own and Cirilla's. He turned his head slowly, trying to make out what the noise was.

In her sleep, Ciri mumbled something incoherent and then turned abruptly, making the rustle of straw and fabric sharp. Geralt breathed out, consciously untensing his muscles as his slow heart returned to normal.

Of course. That was what had woken him. It had taken a few weeks for him to get used to Jaskier's noises enough to not wake at every turn - the only saving grace there was the bard was never quiet, so it never registered as sneaking to Geralt's trained reflexes. The first time he'd left Yennefer alone, after Rinde, it was because he couldn't sleep with her foreign noises. He'd had to train himself not to react to them. But he had, in the end. He'd just have to train himself not to react to Ciri. He closed his eyes again.

It was only the first time that night. After the third time Ciri's unconscious movements woke him, Geralt began the most basic breathing exercise he knew. It wasn't the fault of a child that his reflexes were battle-trained and that he'd rarely known anyone non-hostile, let alone friendly. But keeping a hold on his temper was hard. The acclimation, he thought through gritted teeth, couldn't come soon enough.

Geralt woke again to the noise of someone adding a log to the hearth. Automatically, he looked over at Ciri. Sometime in the night, she'd settled, and Geralt had gratefully fallen back asleep. She frowned, though, as the fire grew louder with its new fuel, not waking, but growing restless again. Geralt grit his teeth. The sleep he'd had was not enough, and he wouldn't sleep through another fretful spell. Hesitantly, he reached a hand out to her head, intending to stroke her hair. Someone had done it for him, when he was sick after the mutagens. But Ciri gasped at the weight of his hand, and her eyes flew open. Geralt jerked his hand away.

"What is it?" she whispered, low and urgent.

"Nothing," he whispered back. "Just the fire. Go back to sleep."

Cirilla glared at him suspiciously, though her human sight couldn't have made out more than the barest outlines in the dim light. Eventually, she closed her eyes.

The next time Geralt woke, it was because Ciri was creeping across the floor. He sat up, hand on his sword, before he was even truly awake, and stared at the source of the noise. Ciri jumped.

"You scared me," she hissed.

"What is it?" he mumbled. His reflexes were more responsive than his brain.

"I'm going to the privy," Ciri hissed again, clearly distraught at relaying this. "Go back to sleep."

Slowly, Geralt took his hand off his sword. "Don't sneak when you come back in," he told her. And she must not have, because he slept on until the morning smell of baking bread woke him.

* * *

"Why did you lie to that man?" Ciri asked from atop Roach that afternoon. They were far away from the village, now.

"I didn't," Geralt grunted. He'd slept enough to sustain him, but his temper was still short. "Your mother's much younger than me."

Ciri huffed. "You know what I mean," she said. "Why did you imply that she was - was -" She struggled for a word. Calanthe must have controlled herself around her granddaughter.

"A camp follower?" Geralt asked. "Old men have young daughters for two reasons. Either their mothers are younger, or they're children of surprise. Someone's bound to know that we're bound together that way. Best to give him a more ordinary story, just in case."

"But why a - camp follower?" Ciri persisted. "Why didn't you tell him your wife was young?"

Geralt caught her eye from the ground. "And where would she be now?" he asked. "Then he'd ask questions. He'd want to know why I escaped and left my wife behind. We don't want questions."

Ciri was quiet for a few moments. Clearly, she was building up to something. He could practically feel her fuming behind him, and he was sure her anger was built up over weeks on the run.

"You have to stop telling people that," she declared eventually. "No one will respect me. We'll come up with another story. A better one." 

Geralt stopped Roach abruptly. His head throbbed from interrupted sleep, and the imperious tone grated on his nerves. He turned to look at her, glaring.

"You're not a princess any more," he said. "You're a refugee. No one will respect you anyway. Camp followers do honest work for coin like everyone else."

For a split second, Cirilla's face was hurt. If she hadn't been atop Roach, Geralt would have bet money that the girl would have run off into the woods. As it was, she set her jaw and dug her knees into the horse's sides, so Geralt had to start walking or get his foot stepped on. They passed the rest of the day in silence.

It was cold that night when they stopped, cold like it had been every night. Geralt risked a few of their precious nuggets of charcoal to cook a hot dinner, then covered the coals with dirt to smother it. The wood here was mostly wet with snow; too smoky to burn even if they could risk a fire all night. The light from a fire was one thing, but the smoke could be seen for miles.

Ciri still hadn't spoken, eating her dinner quickly and stealing glances at him instead. Geralt felt distinctly discomfited, and perhaps a bit guilty for snapping at her earlier. He never did learn. But he didn't know how to begin saying so to her, so he sent her off to find dry leaves and boughs to keep them off the ground instead, while he started clearing the snow and collecting larger deadfall for a lean-to.

By the time she was back, Geralt had dried the ground with a controlled Igni and was coaxing Roach to lay down in the middle of the dry space. She was used to this by now, as was Ciri, who moved to start constructing their bed as Geralt set up the shelter around them both. He paused, though, as Ciri started piling leaves and branches on both sides of Roach.

"What are you doing?" he asked Ciri. The girl normally slept between him and Roach, sheltered from the wind and warmed by their bodies, with Geralt on the outside so he could react quickly to any threat.

"I want to sleep on the inside tonight," she said, with a stubborn jut to her lip that made her look remarkably like her grandmother.

Geralt set his teeth and reminded himself to keep his temper. "You can't," he said. "You'll freeze."

"Roach will keep me warm," Ciri said, patting the horse on the nose. The mare, tired and probably chilled under her blanket herself, made no response. 

"Not warm enough," Geralt said. "Don't be stubborn. If she gets up unexpectedly she could hurt you badly." Whereas in Geralt's arms, he could react quickly enough to roll Ciri out of the way. He knelt down to move the pile of wood to Roach's other side.

"Why does it matter to you?" Ciri asked him, eyes flashing, and Geralt stopped, staring at her. Hadn't he done his best to find her? To protect her? What did she mean? He cocked his head at her and grunted his confusion.

"Since I'm not a princess any more, I'm worthless to you!" she exclaimed. "No better than a camp follower's child, isn't that what you said? So why would you bother?"

Geralt sat back on his heels. Ah. He should have known someone raised in a palace would take his words that way. He opened his mouth, then closed it, and tried again.

"Cirilla," he said. "Why do you think being a camp follower's child is a bad thing?"

This took her aback, not being the argument she was expecting. "Grandmother always said they were no better than they should be," she said, "and everyone laughed at them behind their backs. I don't want that to happen to me."

"Mm," Geralt said. Then he sighed. "You haven't been with me long," he said, "so you haven't seen. A witcher is often treated a lot worse than a camp follower's child. We aren't laughed at, no, but I've been stoned out of more than one town."

"What?" Ciri asked. "But you hunt monsters. You _save_ towns."

"And to be able to do that, I'm mutated," Geralt said. He let his eyes go slit-pupiled again, caught the fading light to make them shine, to make his point. "A camp follower is still human. I'm not. Humanity isn't fond of nonhumans living among them."

He could see Ciri's temper flare up again in her eyes, directed at the world this time instead of him. "Well, they're wrong!" she cried.

Geralt nodded at her. "You think so, but many others do not. Will you let them dictate your opinions on any others?" he asked.

Ciri bit her lip. "Like camp followers?" she asked.

"Like them," Geralt agreed. "They provide a service, and it's those who use that service who look down on them the most. It's hard work, sometimes dangerous."

Slowly, Ciri nodded. "I'll keep my eyes open," she said. "But, Geralt, why did you pick that story? Why not any others?"

Sitting calmly, without an imperious tone ringing in his ears, Geralt found he was able to speak the words he'd actually meant earlier. "People feel clever figuring out a scandal. And salacious tales catch the attention. Likely the innkeep won't remember any other details, not truly." That, he'd learned from Jaskier, a tidbit he'd never expected to use, but he'd seen its utility time and again. And Yennefer had reinforced it. Sex distracts the mind.

"It's like fading into a crowd, but in someone's mind," Ciri said. "Another disguise."

"Yes," Geralt said. "It's to keep you safe."

Unexpectedly, Ciri smiled at him - hesitant and small, but there. She threw herself into his arms again, like she had when they met. Geralt caught her, of course, and held her after a few moments' hesitance. 

"I'm sorry," he said quietly.

"I'm sorry too," Ciri said.

Geralt hummed and dared to stroke her hair. This time, she simply settled into him with a little sigh.

* * *

The second time they shared an inn room was… better. On the road, when the space in the lean-to had been warmed by their three bodies, Geralt let Ciri out of his arms just a bit, just enough so she could move, for a few minutes a night. He paid conscious attention to her breathing patterns, the noises she made when she was just restless and the ones she made when distressed, the smell of her under the smoke and dirt and unwashed wool. And this time, he didn't wait quite so long before stopping. Perhaps they could settle better, this way.

This settlement, by virtue of being so much further north, was closer to the main road and had true beds available. If they were to make it all the way to the keep, they could only afford the one, but the hot pottage and ale - small beer for Ciri - were worth the coin Geralt laid down. 

Jaskier had told him, more than once, that his imperiousness was infuriating; Geralt simply hadn't seen the use in explaining what he thought was self-evident. But Ciri had responded well to it, so before they slept, he spoke to her.

"I've spent a long time on guard," he told her. "If you're too quiet, I'll wake up. Sounds like someone trying to sneak up on me." 

Ciri's face screwed up. "Too quiet?" she said. "That doesn't make any sense."

Geralt shrugged. "It's the truth," he told her.

She bit her lip, but nodded. That's when he should have known something was wrong, but he still didn't know her well enough.

If Ciri was restless through that night, Geralt couldn't tell. He slept as hard as he'd let himself, on the road and vulnerable, and for most of the night wasn't interrupted.

An hour before dawn, the soft scrape of a boot woke him. Geralt's hand was on his sword in an instant, his feet on the floor right after as the door crept open. He moved to put the bed behind him, where Ciri lay, but the covers were crumpled and empty. His heart moved to his throat. Had he slept too soundly? Had she been taken? He took two long strides to the door and threw it open, sword in hand, pointing it at -

Ciri, who gasped and jumped. Geralt dropped his sword arm and reached with the other to gather her into the safety of the room and his embrace, but she slid around him, skittish of the blade after it had been pointed at her, and put a warm loaf of bread on a cloth in front of their brazier.

"Fuck," Geralt said quietly, and put his sword back under the bed, where it had been.

"What's wrong with you?" Ciri hissed, sliding off her boots.

"You were too quiet," Geralt said. "Thought you were an assassin, or a spy. I told you not to sneak."

Ciri huffed. "It's always me that has to change," she said, seating herself in front of the brazier and beginning to eat her bread. She didn't offer any to Geralt. "Why don't you?"

Geralt wanted to say half a hundred things. He was a century old, with eighty years of habit. She had less than a season's experience on the run. It was his skills that were keeping them alive. But he swallowed them all down. She was a child. She'd lost everything. Of course she was resistant to more change.

"I'll… try to remember that," he said instead.

Ciri still didn't offer him any food, and Geralt didn't ask. Instead, she said, "It's still dark yet. The innkeep's wife just made the bread."

"I'll sleep a little longer then," Geralt said. Ciri settled deliberately loudly in response, and Geralt got back in bed and closed his eyes.

* * *

The third time they shared an inn room was the last town before Kaer Morhen. They had to stop and resupply, and it was very nearly a catastrophe.

"Geralt," Ciri said as they approached the town, "I have a bad feeling."

Geralt grunted - he was inclined to give her bad feeling a little more weight than the average child, with what she'd seen, with the power of her line, but as far as he could tell, the magic didn't manifest that way.

"I'm serious!" Ciri insisted. "Something terrible is going to happen if we go into that town."

Geralt stopped Roach and turned to look at her. "Ciri, something terrible will happen to us if we _don't_. The trail up is dangerous. Without supplies we'll starve." She'll starve, he meant. Geralt might make it, but even for a witcher, it wasn't a guarantee.

Ciri gritted her teeth and looked inclined to argue. Geralt cut her off.

"We'll sleep in the stables with Roach," he said. "I'll keep her tack and saddlebags ready to go. We can ride out if we hear anything."

Ciri still looked mutinous, but she nodded. "All right," she said. She'd gone hungry before Geralt found her. Hadn't starved, but the bite in her belly made her more inclined to go along, Geralt thought.

Witchers were a familiar sight to these people, and it made it harder to pass as a veteran and his daughter. But Geralt entered the town as dark was falling, and chose a different inn than he normally would. The stablemaster wasn't as thorough here, but Geralt would give Roach a good going-over as soon as they were safe. This proved to be his biggest mistake.

"Oh, your daughter is a darling," the landlady, a matronly woman who looked like she was missing only a baby to dandle on her knee to complete the picture of a kindly grandmother, said. Ciri turned to hide her face in Geralt's cloak.

"She's shy," Geralt said. "With her mother gone…" 

"Of course, of course," the innkeep said, nodding. "So two big bowls of stew for the weary travellers, board for your horse, and a room." 

Geralt winced. "No room," he said. "We can't afford it. We're due east in the morning, and it's a long journey. She needs a new cloak for the weather. We can sleep in the stables."

The woman frowned and put her hands on her hips. "Put a mite like that in the stables?" she exclaimed. "In this weather? She'll freeze. You can do some heavy lifting for me, strong man like you, and you both can sleep in front of the hearth once everyone clears out. Won't be long. Gets dark fast in winter."

"Father -" Ciri started, high and frail-sounding.

"Now, my girl, it wouldn't do to be ungrateful," Geralt said, squeezing her shoulder meaningfully.

"I was just going to ask if I could sit by the fire until dinner," Ciri said, an edge of a whine in her voice. She squeezed back. 

"Say thank you to Madam Innkeeper first," Geralt said.

Ciri turned from his sheltering arm and dipped a court-perfect curtsey at the innkeep, who giggled. "Thank you for your generosity, Madam," she said.

"My, what manners!" the landlady said, hand over her mouth. "Lovely girl you have."

Geralt cleared his throat. "Yes, her mother had… many skills. You can go sit by the fire now, my girl."

The innkeep tutted at him disapprovingly, but sent him to the cellar to bring up barrels for the next hour anyway. Mindful of his eyes catching the firelight and giving them away, Geralt was not quite as fast as he could have been, but as things cleared out, he received two steaming bowls of stew anyway.

"Father," Ciri hissed at him, much less frail than before, when he brought her her dinner.

"Daughter," Geralt said back at her, pointedly.

"You promised," Ciri said, digging into her stew sullenly.

"I didn't promise," Geralt corrected. He tried not to do that, because he knew how hard they were to keep. "And two refugees can't afford to turn down an offer like this."

Ciri took his point, but she wasn't happy about it. She scooped up a hunk of turnip with a scowl that wouldn't have been out of place on her grandmother.

"Oh, my," the landlady fussed as she came out of the back room with a bundle of furs and saw them. "Is the stew really that bad?"

"Not at all," Geralt said, trying to smile in a way that wouldn't ping the danger sense in the human hindbrain. "She's just very attached to our horse, you know how girls get. I promised we'd sleep in the stable to keep her safe."

"She's kept us safe!" Ciri exclaimed. "And warm, too. Why can't we stay with her?"

"Bless, child," the innkeep said, putting her bundle down to pat Ciri's hand, "I know horses are in short supply these days, but my stablemaster sleeps down there, too. He'll keep an eye on your mare."

"We thank you for it," Geralt said, and finished off his stew. 

It wasn't long after that when he and Ciri were bundled up in front of the fire, cushions stuffed with horsehair under their heads. The clean straw of the stable might have been more comfortable, Geralt thought, but this was warmer, and for Ciri's sake, that was more important. He thought of her bad feeling, and considered meditation instead of sleep, but his trained instincts sensed nothing wrong, so he let himself drift down into a light slumber.

The whisper of a heavy cloak sweeping along the floor woke him. Geralt almost stayed still, ready to give Ciri a look for sneaking again, but this was a sturdier cloak than she wore, and he could hear her sleeping breaths next to him. Instead he rolled over, as if in sleep, so he was facing the door. The noise stopped suddenly, but when he made no more moves, whoever was sneaking around continued.

"Sure it's them?" a hoarse male voice said. The owner of the cloak.

A second person - their landlady - snorted. "Think I don't know a witcher when I see one?" she said, voice low. "The girl has court manners, and he's far too strong, besides the eyes. And neither of them used a name."

"Sure as sure, then," the male voice said. He smelled of horses and hay - the stablemaster. "I'll ride for the soldiers tonight. How will we keep them here?"

"You lame their horse before they leave, or make her sick. Something that will heal in a few days. I'll lament that you've run off, note that he knows how to care for horses, tell them that they can stay at least until the mare is fit to ride if he does your work. They'll have no choice," the landlady said. "Go on now, get some food. It's a long, cold ride."

Geralt kept quiet and still until both sets of footsteps slipped away, then he shook Ciri awake with a hand over her mouth. "Quiet," he whispered in her ear, just a breath, and she froze. He waited until he was sure she was going to be, then moved his hand.

"You were right," he said, quiet as he could. "We're in danger. You remember how to count your heartbeats?" he asked. Ciri nodded. "Good. Count six hundred heartbeats, or until you hear a big commotion. Then I need you to go in the larder, quickly, and steal as much food as you can carry. Carrots and winter apples especially, but cheese and flour too. Do you understand?"

Ciri nodded again, and Geralt listened, hand on his sword, before getting up. "Six hundred heartbeats," he said again. "Until then, pretend you're asleep."

He went after the stablemaster first, because if he lamed Roach, they were well and truly fucked. She'd been up the Witcher's Trail before, was a strong horse accustomed to Axii and the sorts of survival training necessary to a witcher's mount. Fortunately, laming a horse without immediately visible injury wasn't a fast process, and Roach was reactive. Geralt could steal up on the stablemaster before he entered her stall, holding a sword to the man's throat before he could react.

"Drop it," he growled, and the man dropped the handful of small stones he'd no doubt planned on shoving in Roach's hooves, to give her stone bruises that looked natural. The cold, quiet rage that had seized Geralt when he realized these people were selling out Ciri grew stronger when he saw those little stones, and he had to breathe deeply before he cut the man's throat. The witchers needed this town. He couldn't cause that kind of trouble here.

"Where's the camp you were riding to?" he asked instead. When the stablemaster snarled, Geralt stomped the sole of his hobnailed boots down on the man's foot, covering his mouth reflexively to muffle his howl of pain.

"Ah - ah, fine," the man said, panting, when Geralt took his hand away. "Southeast, three days' ride."

"Fuck," Geralt said. Closer than he'd like, and no doubt the man would ride hard for them as soon as he and Ciri were gone. "Who else knows?" 

"Fuck you," the man spat, and then stiffened when Geralt pressed the sword against his throat hard enough to draw blood. "Just me and Mildred, don't want to split the money any more," he said.

Geralt hummed, satisfied. The man's heart didn't pick up, his breathing was steady. He was telling the truth. "Good," he said. "Now walk with me, unless you want your throat cut."

They stepped forward to the wall where the spare tack rested, and the man began to struggle. Geralt considered his options for a moment, and then slung one elbow around the man's throat, pressing hard on both arteries. He counted three slow heartbeats before the man slumped, and Geralt threw him in an empty stall before trussing him up.

He judged perhaps five minutes had passed, which meant Ciri would begin moving in five more. He had to find the innkeep in that time so she didn't raise the alarm. Geralt stole out of the stable and back into the inn.

Conveniently, the woman was in the kitchen, soaking grains for the morning's porridge. Her instincts were better than the stablemaster's, or Geralt's boots were louder on stone than wood, because her hand darted for a knife and she whirled around as soon as he was within arm's reach. But an aging landlady was no match for a witcher, and Geralt had the knife out of her hand and pressed against her in a matter of moments. He felt her chest heave against him, drawing in air, and he shoved his hand against her mouth and the blade against her throat.

"If you scream, I will slit your throat and damn the consequences," he said into her ear. "You know witchers, hmm? Well, the girl you were threatening is my daughter. Tell me what witchers do to those who hurt their own."

The woman shuddered in his grip, and Geralt allowed himself a dark little laugh. "Exactly. Come with me, we're taking a walk." He kept his hand over her mouth, although it left her hands free, and escorted her through the night's shadows into the stables. Only once they were away from the population of the inn did he let her mouth free.

The landlady immediately made use of it. "Mutant filth! How dare you touch me," she spat. 

"Easily," Geralt said. "Just as easily as I could break your neck." He shoved her towards the stall with the stablemaster. 

She went, stumbling, and turned to look at him hatefully. Geralt rolled his eyes. "Go," he said.

"Now what?" the woman said resentfully. Most of the fight had gone out of her when she saw her accomplice unconscious and bound.

"Now, you tell me how you came to know that I was worth money," Geralt said.

The woman spat and turned her head away. "No?" Geralt asked, and made sure to press up against her so she could feel him shrug. "Fine then." He moved the knife from her throat to the laces of her dress - being seen naked in public was somehow, worse than death for many humans, and it was bitter cold. The woman stiffened against him, and he stopped.

"Fine," she said, voice quavering. "If you stop that, I'll tell you."

Geralt moved the knife back to where it was. "Tell me," he said.

"They had a magic paper," she said. "Turned up at all the towns around here, on the notice board at the same time. Described you and the girl, and how to find them. Three days ago ours went up in black fire that burned nothing else."

Geralt made a sound in the back of his throat. "Thank you," he said. It had been long enough that Cirilla was probably through ransacking the larder, and he shoved the woman into the stall with the man she'd conspired with. "I'll be out of your hands soon. Just a few more things," he said, smiling in a way he knew unsettled humans.

Despite herself, the woman trembled. "Are you going to use me to slake your unnatural lusts?" she asked. "With your daughter here? Please, have mercy."

A bark of laughter left Geralt's throat. "With you?" he sneered. "My lover is a sorceress. I wouldn't stoop so low."

The woman puffed herself up, half indignant and half relieved. Geralt cut her off before she could say anything. "That's enough. Strip him, down to his braes."

"What?" the innkeep asked, a little bolder without a blade pressed to her. "No!"

"Do you doubt I'll kill you both if you disobey me?" Geralt asked, throwing the kitchen knife carelessly behind him and drawing his steel sword. The woman shrank back. "No? Good. Strip him."

As the landlady was doing so, Ciri slipped in with a sack bulging full. She looked to Geralt, eyes a bit frantic.

"You remember how to load the saddlebags and tack up the horse?" he asked her, eyes on the woman. His voice was much softer with Ciri, and the change in tone caught the woman's attention before he raised an eyebrow and she began to work the stablemaster out of his shirt, trying to figure out how to get it off his bound wrists.

"Yes," Ciri said, breathing a little more steadily when she saw the two people at swordpoint.

"Good," Geralt said. "Do it. Check her girth twice, she likes to puff out her belly. Oh, fucking leave that," he added to the landlady. "Your turn."

The woman paled. "I thought you were above slaking your lusts with me," she said. 

Geralt nodded. "I am," he said. "Strip down to your shift anyway, or you'll be sating the bloodlust you roused in me tonight." He gestured meaningfully with the sword and bared his teeth.

Ciri was done with Roach by the time the woman was down to her shift and wool stockings, shivering in the winter air.

"What are you doing?" the girl asked in an undertone.

"Remember what I told you about scandal?" he said, stepping forward.

"People like one," she said. "It distracts."

"Exactly right," he said. He seized the landlady's wrist and hauled her down to the hay with one hand, undoing the ties on the still-unconscious stablemaster with the other. Then he began to lash their wrists together.

When the inkeep realized what was happening, she began to struggle. "I'm a respectable woman!" she fussed. "You can't do this to me!"

"I can't?" Geralt asked. "Hand me a bit and bridle," he said to Ciri. "I think she needs a lesson in what I can't do."

Immediately the woman shut her mouth, but Geralt pinched her nose and waited til she gasped for breath and shoved the bit in her mouth. "I was just going to gag you, but this works better," he mused, as the woman struggled. He stripped the shirt from the stablemaster's arms and lashed them together facing each other, wrist to wrist and ankle to ankle. Then he disheveled their clothes and hair and stepped back.

"A decent distraction," he said. "All right, let's go."

* * *

It was a few day's journey to the keep, still, and Geralt pushed Roach as hard as he dared. Ciri had managed to pilfer oats for her from the larder, smart girl she was, so she could go further in the cold, but it was a long night and day's ride until Geralt felt comfortable stopping.

Ciri was exhausted. Roach was exhausted. He was all right, but when they got to Kaer Morhen, he'd sleep for three days. But even so, there was something he needed to say, something he couldn't put off any longer.

"Ciri," he said, and she looked up from where she was half-heartedly arranging rocks for a firepit. She was too tired to do more than that.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I should have listened to you. We were almost captured and only luck let us know. I'll pay more attention to you from now on."

Ciri regarded him. "It's all right," she said. "I didn't know why it was dangerous. But Geralt?" she asked, tilting her head. "Can I ask you something?"

"What?" he asked.

"At Kaer Morhen, will I have my own room?" she said. "Only, it's just that bad things happen when we share one inside."

Geralt surprised himself with a small huff of laughter. He reached out to gently stroke her hair. "There's plenty of rooms at Kaer Morhen. You can certainly have your own."

**Author's Note:**

> [Reblog if you liked it!](https://sirsparklepants.tumblr.com/post/631719990182264832/tender-places-t-gen-6155-words-the-first-time)


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